Pedal ranking - Light to Heavy Feel

Interesting thread, but how are we defining 'heavy'?

The amount of resistance against your foot pressing it down? Surely that is a product of the spring tension, which is adjustable in all pedals?

Or the 'feel' of the beater swing path as your foot presses down? I guess this is a product of the shape of the cam.

Which one are you guys using to define the 'heaviness' of a pedal?
 
Interesting thread, but how are we defining 'heavy'?

The amount of resistance against your foot pressing it down? Surely that is a product of the spring tension, which is adjustable in all pedals?

Or the 'feel' of the beater swing path as your foot presses down? I guess this is a product of the shape of the cam.

Which one are you guys using to define the 'heaviness' of a pedal?


It's gotta' be by subjective feel.

An objective measurement could be made with some type of weight measurement gauge attached to the pedal. To get high tech about it, an x-y graph could be plotted, with x axis given to amount of pedal travel, and y axis to amount of force applied.
Each time you changed spring tension though, the graph would change.

I've seen a lot of graphs like this done with compound bow cams. The amount of force required is initially high, and drops off quickly as the bow is drawn back. I'd imagine drum pedal cams work on the same principle.

I have to revise my statements about the DW9000 though. Now that I've had it a while, yes it feels a bit heavy compared to my lighter pedals. The smoothness is very deceptive at first and seems to offset any heaviness felt.

I think Yamaha should be added to the list. Not sure where you'd put them, except to say I think it should be towards the lighter end.
 
I recently picked up a used Pearl 902 double, and I have to say I am quite surprised with it. Compared to an old school Powershifter Eliminator (the first one actually, double chain cam), this pedal is a bit lighter in feel. Seems a bit lighter in feel than 2004-2005 Iron Cobras also. These are all I have to compare it to.

Oh, and by feel I mean the overall effort it takes to play the pedal, pushing it down, its resistance on the way up, how easy it is to start and stop it.
 
It's all relative. DWs have a very heavy beater stock. With a light beater, the 9000s felt like a completely different pedal. Same this with the ICs.

Funny you mention those. I'm using a big ol' DW beater on my offset cam Iron cobra. Wasn't getting enough "oomph" out of the IC's standard tiny little beater.
 
Wasn't getting enough "oomph" out of the IC's standard tiny little beater.

With beaters like that (DW) the IC's would give a good hit on the bass drum though, and a decent rebound. IC's standard beaters are still pretty amazing though.. I Fixed them to a pair of Dixon's just for the heck of it, and the pedal was amazingly smooth and had a good rebound.
 
Funny you mention those. I'm using a big ol' DW beater on my offset cam Iron cobra. Wasn't getting enough "oomph" out of the IC's standard tiny little beater.

I did something similar. Put the bigger DW style Tama beater on a Speed Cobra and made it feel alot more like my DW5000 (which I like.) Sounds alot better than the tiny stock Speed Cobra beater too.
 
Funny you mention those. I'm using a big ol' DW beater on my offset cam Iron cobra. Wasn't getting enough "oomph" out of the IC's standard tiny little beater.

Ha! I did the exact same thing for the exact same reason! Wow
 
Not bad, my rankings seem to be spot on. Some nice additions there, dre25. Anyone have a contrary point of view?

Supposing I draw an imaginary line between the "light" and "heavy" pedals:

Light
Axis AL-2
Pearl Demon Drive
Tama Speed Cobra
Pearl Eliminator

Heavy
Mapex falcon
Dw9000
Tama Iron Cobra
Dw5000

Work for anyone? I think there are people who prefer light and others who prefer heavy. This sort of list might be useful in figuring out whether a certain type of pedal would be better suited for them. Though things change!

- Reggae Mangle


I agree with this.. but id put the 9000 as the heavest of them all. I didn't mind the 5000.. hated the 9000


id toss tricks in the light list too.
 
I'd place the Trick at the top of the heavy list above or below the Falcons actually. There's "mass" to the pedal. It's extremely fluid. But the board seems to have this "resistance" or "upward buoyancy" that I find comfortable with respect to my playing style.
 
I guess its all feel to each drummer because I played dw9000 in the studio last time and I really like it a lot. I didn't think there was anything heavy about it, it was like a machine! I didn't set it up or adjust it so maybe it was changed from the way it was bought or not, I don't know. I have a speed king, eliminators, and I have played on ic's. nothing feels heavy to me really but I also have a size 12 foot so maybe that's why?
 
I recently bought a used DW 3000 (new model) to use as a practice pedal with my Gibralter kick practice pad. It arrived in great condition and is very smooth in motion.

However, I noticed the 3000 dual chain was heavier in feel than the single chain 5000 (I bought in 1998) when used with a real bass drum, so when I tried it recently a group session, I didn't feel quite as nimble as I did with the 5000 pedal. The 3000 felt like it had more meat on the thumps than the 5000 did.

I'll probably use the 3000 for practice at home, and continue with the older 5000 for live music.
I wonder if the beater on the 3000 is a bit larger than the 5000.
 
changing the beaters on any pedal changes the feel..

now.. longboards are going to naturally feel lighter and faster...

but on pedals like the axis al-2 (not the x) and the demon drives you can adjust the VDL or the "power/feness" setting which change the leverage.

this can make these pedals FAR faster and lighter FEELING than the others. Not sure what other pedals have this. even moving your beaters up or down. adding weights, springs. distance from skin all that stuff change it.

after playing axis for years and demons for half a year now i had a 9000 for about 2 months. hated it. could not dial it in. springs, distances, everything. felt to heavy and slow for me.. but I'm used to longboards with a forwarder beater. I do have another buddy who found them heavy too...... I found the 5000's pretty close to my IC that i had for years........ but i used big wood beaters on the IC.


beater distance makes a bigger difference than people think for this too... if your beaters are 2 inches away.. it will feel light with your springs maxed... if your beaters are 180 degrees.. your springs could be next to off and it would be hard to hit the skin.


its best to learn how your pedals work, how you like your settings and feel.. then find a pedal that can achieve that. I prefer light fast pedals that hit hard and i can do heel toe on... so that leaves me axis or demons. maybe tricks but I'm not putting a deposit on them incase i hate em
 
It's all kind of relative unless you label one pedal to be a "regular" feel pedal. And then, all other pedals can be determined to be heavy or light when compared to that one regular feel pedal.
 
This is usually the kind of thing I dig into....and somewhere I listed all the pedals I have which is large number of the ones here,...maybe all except the iron cobra...

I do agree that some may feel "lighter" out of the gate....meaning with the factory setup, however there are several things as others have pointed out that can be adjusted including the torque arm affect of how far up the beater mass is from the rotational axis.

All of these facets can be changed...yes the dw 9000, 7000, etc has that glorious wrecking ball feel with the larger beater which I enjoy....

The reason i halted from going berserk with my typical anal appraisal, is I found that, for me, I can make each pedal be what I want it to be....and I can be as good as I can possibly be on a p900 or the pro1v. It's all in the adjustment and parameter control. So, out of convenience I stick with the Trick cause it is so easy to reach down and adjust the things I like to mess with from time to time.

Due to the spring compression design and motion of the trick, it has the most apparent feel difference when accelerating towards the batter head, but not enough to proclaim it the "best"...

They are all great pedals and can be manipulated to do what you want with some cases of changing the style of/weight of the beater. They can all feel very light with some adjustment.
 
I got an Offset double kick pedal. It feels really heavy compared to my P900s. Also feels a LOT heavier than a DW9000 I've played on but I haven't played a 9000 in a while so I'm going off a foggy memory there.
 
With a light beater, the 9000s felt like a completely different pedal.

Interesting. It would be helpful if the weight was listed in the description of beaters then wouldn't it?
 
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